Lab Weekly - 11/17/2023
2023 Holiday Shopping Trends, plus, the latest news and stats, including Meta and Amazon's social commerce partnership, Google's new search annotation feature, and Microsoft's rebranding of Bing Chat
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2023 Holiday Shopping Trends
As the holiday shopping season gets longer, consumers grow more value-driven and pragmatic. With Thanksgiving right around the corner, let’s take a look at the retail trends emerging out of this early stage of the holiday season, in particular, how a year’s economic uncertainty and a summer of “funflation” has impacted shopper behavior this year, and what innovative experiential retail may help win over shoppers.
In case you missed it…
Event Recap: OpenAI’s Inaugural Developer Conference
At its first-ever developer conference, OpenAI announced significant updates to ChatGPt and beyond, including the launch of custom GPT bots, a Builder tool that requires no coding, and an upcoming GPT store that recalls Apple’s launch of the App Store.
The State of Gaming: What Brands Need to Know in 2023
In 2023, brands can aim higher than those turnkey mobile game solutions and escape the non-premium perception of direct-response ads to explore the full spectrum of brand opportunities that gaming has to offer.
Meta Connect 2023 Recap: Everything Brand Marketers Need To Know
During its annual Connect conference, Meta offered crucial updates regarding its AI and metaverse strategies, signaling another attempt at consumer attention land-grabbing
Meta And Amazon Team Up On New In-App Shopping Feature [TechCrunch]
Meta is collaborating with Amazon to supercharge social commerce by allowing users to link their Meta and Amazon accounts for seamless in-app purchases on Facebook and Instagram. Once linked, users can shop on Meta's social platforms using their Amazon payment and shipping details with a few clicks, and products advertised on Facebook and Instagram will benefit from Amazon's real-time pricing, Prime status, and delivery information.
Needless to say, this initiative is expected to enhance ad targeting and conversion rates, providing a significant revenue boost for Meta, Amazon, and advertisers. As the leaders in social media and ecommerce join forces, this collaboration simplifies the shopping experience, allowing customers to seamlessly purchase products from social media ads using familiar Amazon payment and shipping methods. For brands experimenting with social commerce, this integration offers an unprecedented opportunity to tap into a vast customer base, leveraging Meta's detailed user data and Amazon's robust logistics for a win-win outcome.
We recently wrote about the awkward status quo of social commerce and the need for a strategic pivot. Social commerce in the U.S. is at an interesting juncture, with platforms like TikTok seeking to transform social media from a discovery channel into a direct sales driver. TikTok parent ByteDance posted $29 billion in revenues in its second quarter, according to reporting by The Information, with 40% year-over-year growth that far outpaces its U.S. rivals like Meta. With this milestone partnership, it looks like a pivot has been made; Now the ball is in consumers’ court. Brands, meanwhile, must navigate these changes and collaborate with creators to ensure authenticity and engagement in this evolving social commerce landscape.
Related: Klarna expands Creator Shops as consumers embrace social commerce [PYMNTS]; How Chinese ecommerce platforms like Shein, Temu, and TikTok Shop are going global [Rest of World]
Microsoft Rebrands Bing Chat To Copilot [The Verge]
RIP, Bing Chat. On Wednesday, Microsoft announced its decision to rebrand Bing’s AI mode as “Copilot” as part of the company’s broader strategy to create a unified AI experience for both consumers and enterprise customers. If you recall, Copilot had been the branding that Microsoft uses for the AI chatbot inside Windows 11. Microsoft is now pitching Copilot as the free version of its AI chatbot, with Copilot for Microsoft 365 (which used to be Microsoft 365 Copilot) as the paid option. The free version of Copilot will still be accessible in Bing and Windows, but it will also have its own dedicated domain over at copilot.microsoft.com, just like ChatGPT.
The competition in consumer-facing generative AI is getting fierce by the day. Earlier this week, OpenAI has to temporarily pause new upgrades to ChatGPT Plus due to overwhelming demand following the announcements at its first-ever developer event last week. Despite Microsoft’s heavy investment in (and general alliance with) OpenAI, Microsoft is still competing with ChatGPT for users. This rebranding positions Microsoft's AI services in direct competition with other major AI platforms like ChatGPT. By adopting the Copilot brand, Microsoft aligns its AI-powered services more clearly as one coherent service with a paid tier and a free one.
Related: Microsoft’s Copilot AI gets more personalized in its first update since launch [The Verge]; Microsoft Copilot Studio lets anyone build custom AI copilots [The Verge]; Samsung details “Galaxy AI’ and a feature that can translate phone calls in real time [The Verge]
Google Testing Adding User Annotations In Search [The Verge]
Google is experimenting with a feature that lets users add personal notes to search results, which will then be made accessible to everyone. This is designed to enhance the search experience by incorporating personal tips and insights, particularly useful for subjects such as cooking and travel. As part of Google's experimental Search Labs, this feature is optional and includes the ability to add stickers, photographs, and AI-created images, but is currently limited to users in the United States.
This is an interesting approach to enriching the search results and adding social elements to the search experience. If widely adopted, it could transform the way information is accessed and shared on the internet, fostering a more collaborative and interactive search experience. By integrating user-generated content, Google aims to provide a more personalized and diverse range of insights. Of course, there are concerns about the potential spread of misinformation, but Google says it intends to use a combination of algorithmic and human moderation to maintain the integrity of these notes.
If the notes feature is well-received, it could lead to increased user engagement with search results. Down the road, Google might even offer brands the option to sponsor or create their own notes. This could open up new advertising avenues, allowing brands to provide helpful information or tips related to their products directly within the search results.
Related: Bing adds AI-generation captions to some search result snippets [Search Engine Land]; YouTube previews Dream Track and Music AI tools that clone famous singers [The Verge]
Bluesky, a decentralized social media app, has announced that it has now crossed 2 million users — doing so just two months after crossing 1 million users. The company is also finally about to add a public web interface, which might help make it a more attractive destination for journalists and other users.
Facebook and YouTube are the most popular sites for news in the US, a new report by the Pew Research Center found. 30% of US adults regularly get their news from Facebook; 26%, from YouTube; 16% from Instagram; 14% from TikTok; 12% from X; and 8% from Reddit. It’s especially notable that 32% of 18-29 year-olds in the U.S. regularly get their news from TikTok, a much higher percentage than the all-age average.
Google pays Apple 36% of the revenue the search giant earns from search ads through Safari, per the US v. Google testimony of Alphabet's main economics expert, Bloomberg reports. The total payment in 2022 was reportedly “well over $10 billion.”
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